"Dansui!" to be honest was my guilty pleasure drama. I have an affinity for the sports genre (beyond the 'yummy yaoi boys'), and this one was an honest mixed bag. It wasn't super great, but it wasn't terrible either.
The story, which is competition between a no-name school and a high ranked school, with some ex-friend, sorta rivals is nothing new to the genre. It's pretty see though with some fun moments exploring relationships AS FRIENDS and RIVALS, growing up, and competition. If you're looking for yaoi, I'd stick with the BL movies since this one has none of that going on. A sports story that actually sticks to the sport, with a surprising amount of technical lingo and improvement.
Acting, most of these guys are stage actors, which is why a lot of people commented about the 'over emoting' or 'over acting'. It's a hard transition but overall most everyone did a good job. I didn't have any really emotional moments, and no one really stood out to me. I fell in love with Taira (Ozawa Ren), since the development of his character was rather rushed but he had some major turn arounds in emotion that were pulled off fairly well. For as much as the main cast was cute and fluffy, they didn't have as much pull for me. Nothing comment-able, aside as much as you think Harumi (Akazawa Tomoru) is going to be the annoying character; he's not that bad.
What a killed this drama for me was the ending. It was not satisfactory AT ALL. We get the competition we've been waiting for, but no closure. You're holding your breath waiting for an ending, and it doesn't come. Although this is being carried over into a stage play, I'm not happy as just a drama watcher.
The music, ending theme is actually sung by a few members of the cast (they come from musical actors after all) is pretty cute. Otherwise, nothing standing out. The rewatch value is low because of the ending, but at the same time it's short enough and cute enough I wouldn't mind spending 4 hours of my time watching again.
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